


Girls' Night

by xenoglossy



Category: Persona 2
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-11
Updated: 2018-09-11
Packaged: 2019-07-10 21:38:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15958055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xenoglossy/pseuds/xenoglossy
Summary: Maya, Ulala, and Eriko try to enjoy some down time.





	Girls' Night

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Fortune_Maiden](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fortune_Maiden/gifts).



They’d all been supposed to go out together--a little group outing to unwind after everything that had happened. But Katsuya, ever the responsible one, had said he was going to go shopping for new armor and weapons for all of them and then turn in early, and Baofu had decided at the last minute that he needed to... do whatever kinds of things Baofu did when he went off alone. He wasn’t very forthcoming, and Maya wasn’t sure she wanted to know in any case.

“So it’s girls’ night, then!” Ulala had said, and now here they were, Maya and Ulala and Eriko, at Shiraishi Ramen. They ordered at the counter--Maya and Eriko ordered ramen and Ulala got a combo plate and an extra side of gyoza--and then found themselves a table. As soon as she sat down, Maya had felt exhaustion settle into her bones. They’d really been running themselves ragged the past several days, and while healing always gave her a small boost in energy, it wasn’t enough to counteract the effects of hauling all over town fighting demons and humans, collecting rumors, getting lost in mazes, and, well, everything else. As long as she kept busy she could ignore it, but now that she was stationary for the moment, it had caught up to her. She resisted the urge to rest her head on the table. _Think positive, Maya!_ she told herself. _Sure, it’s been tough lately, but right now you can enjoy a nice dinner and maybe some drinks with your friends_. Well, one acquaintance and one friend. Who had tried to kill her recently, and they still hadn’t had a chance to talk about that, with everything else that had been happening. _No_ , she told herself firmly, _we’re not going to get into that now. Let’s just relax and have some fun._

Maya made some attempts at small talk, but it didn’t take off; Ulala seemed to be in a bad mood, and Eriko uninterested in the conversation. Fortunately, these attempts were eventually interrupted by the arrival of the Shiraishi lady with the food. The ramen bowls were satisfyingly large, but Ulala’s combo plate was gigantic--never mind the gyoza.

“Are you sure you can eat all that?” Maya teased.

“I just get so hungry when we’ve been fighting for hours,” Ulala said, sounding a bit defensive. “I mean, you work up an appetite doing it, and then there’s no food in there, unless we wanted to blow all of our money on Trish’s ice cream.”

Maya gave a small laugh. “Yeah, it’s probably not worth it.”

“Though it would be interesting,” Eriko said thoughtfully, “to experience the flavor of ice cream that is not of this world. Just once, at least.”

“So do it on your own dime,” said Ulala. “You’re a model, right? I’m sure you can afford it.” She’d started out at least attempting to sound like she was joking, but it had deteriorated into obvious bitterness by the time she was finished.

“Do you think it would work if we spread a rumor that Trish was lowering her prices?” Maya put in quickly, before Ulala could get any farther down that path.

“On the ice cream, or just in general?” Ulala said.

“Oh, in general, definitely,” Maya said, breathing an internal sigh of relief.

“Somehow I suspect it wouldn’t,” said Eriko.

“Even though spreading a rumor about the ice cream was what made her start selling ice cream in the first place? I mean, she’s clearly not immune,” said Ulala.

Eriko shrugged. “Still, though... I can’t picture it.”

Ulala considered for a moment. “Yeah, me neither, honestly.”

“The world could end and she’d probably still charge the same,” Maya said.

Ulala laughed. “Yeah, I can just see her price-gouging the cockroaches, or whatever’s left.”

“Perhaps we shouldn’t be joking about the end of the world,” Eriko pointed out. “After all, if the pole shift really happens... well. It will be no joke, certainly.”

“Ugh,” said Ulala. “Did you have to bring that up?”

Eriko shrugged delicately. “I’m sorry,” she said. “But it _is_ true.”

An uncomfortable silence descended. Maya tried to focus on her ramen. It _was_ delicious, and Ulala hadn’t been wrong about working up an appetite. Still, now that it had been brought up, it was hard not to think about the responsibilities that were weighing on them, hard not to feel like she should probably be doing something else. Of course, one way or another, she had to eat, but still. She could have gotten takeout and then gone to help Katsuya, or something more productive than this.

They finished their meal mostly in silence, foregoing the drinks they’d talked about having earlier. (Maybe that wasn’t much of a loss; Shiraishi’s selection wasn’t the best anyway, although Maya had never really been a cocktail enthusiast.) Maya paid for the food out of their shared pool of money from the demons and various errands they’d undertaken--or rather, the half of it she hadn’t given to Katsuya earlier, which was still more money than she was accustomed to carrying around on a regular basis--and they headed out towards the train station. Eriko, apparently rather energetic, set a brisk pace; Maya and Ulala fell behind a bit.

“Everything okay, Ma-ya?” Ulala asked her, softly.

“Of course!” Maya said, smiling brightly at her. “Why do you ask?”

“Well, I know this was meant to be an opportunity for us to relax a little and it didn’t really work out that way. Which is partly my fault. So I guess I just wanted to say I’m sorry about that.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Maya told her. “It’s fine. We all have a lot on our minds right now.”

“So maybe we should take our minds off things with something a little more distracting than dinner?” Ulala suggested. “Karaoke, maybe?”

And Maya _was_ very tired, and it might have been more responsible to just go home and go to bed, but even so.... “That sounds wonderful,” she said, really meaning it. “Let’s go ask Eriko if she wants to join in.”

Maybe they could still get something out of tonight, after all.


End file.
